The Confidence Coach: Build your confidence today with Stefanie Sword-Williams

0:16Stephanie Sword Williams

0:30to host workshops at Google, Unilever, Bumble, and SmartWorks. I don't open with the fact that I'm a TEDx speaker, Forbes under 30, my book sold 10 ,000 copies. Plus, like, I don't open my presentations by listing out my CV. Because I want everyone in the room to feel like this time that they're spending is about them. Women have traditionally been criticized more. They're known as braggy, boastful, bossy, too assertive. There's a lot of language that gets carried around when women are confident in themselves that it's not well received. Men often feel they don't need my message. They already have social acceptance.

1:13Self-promotion. In very simple terms, what is it and why does it matter? Can it help you in relationships? When you look back at those tough moments, those hard times, would you say, are those the ones that made you, in a way?

1:41Stephanie, who are you and what drives you to do what you do? I'm a person that thrives on connection. being in spaces with people learning about stories and feeling part of something that is bigger than myself and the thing that motivates me to do what I do is that I never want anybody to feel overlooked or undervalued did you ever feel undervalued yes when various times in my life. So I think throughout my career, for sure, I think throughout different experiences as I was growing up. And as a result, it always led me to feeling like I, whatever I did, almost wasn't enough. I also didn't ever feel very smart.

2:35I wasn't very like the smartest person in the room. I was very creative at the time. And I had quite an academic family. And they never, you know made me feel not smart enough but I never felt smart enough in those situations so I often felt like I needed to prove myself or do more or give more I realized recently one of my flaws is over giving and I think that's about proving myself and validation and those external approvals that I have had to work through but ultimately the desire to help other people comes from me not wanting other people to feel the same way I felt. So you feel or you felt that you were undervalued.

3:19You didn't feel like you were enough. And then at some point you want to do something about it and the first thing that you want to do is to make sure that no one feels in that way. All right, so when you have that calling, what do you do? so for me personally I guess my journey has been it hasn't been a mapped out clear route and I think that's important to say so when I started in my career I worked in advertising and a big part of what I loved about advertising was storytelling and being creative you know sharing narratives learning from different people and the thing that I was always really drawn to was purpose-led communications.

4:02So I'm obviously quite a deep person because I wasn't bothered about creating campaigns for Nike. You know, I wasn't bothered about a glamorous Coca-Cola advert. Like what I really resonated with was often not for profit work or campaigns or movements or initiatives that were doing good in the world. So I found that even though I didn't jump straight into the business that I run right now, working and advertising for the first seven years, what I had a very clear aspiration to work towards was working on meaningful work. And I think that comes down to this core feeling of like wanting to put good into the world and wanting to have an existence that adds value to other people.

4:45And so even though I was working in the advertising industry, which, you know, is arguably not great for the world because we sell people products that they don't always need, I was always looking for opportunities, jobs, careers that would allow me to have that meaningful footprint on the world. And when I realized that, sadly, when you work for a company, you don't really have that much control or autonomy over what you get to work on. And if I really wanted to make a positive impact in the world, I needed to go run my own business. And that's why I started doing it. Imagine we just meet in the street.

5:21we're both walking our dogs and we have this small talk and one of those small talk questions are what do you do you only have like perhaps 30 seconds up to a minute give it to me what do you do i run a business called fuck being humble all right and then i intentionally pause because the other person is always like did you say fuck being humble and i say yes i did and they go they'll either say I love that or they'll say explain it to me and I sort of explain to them that I am a founder and an author and I help people be unapologetically proud of what they do and get over the fear of self-promotion and I do that because I want to help people get what they deserve in their careers.

6:06How do you help them? I give them the permission to show up, act authentically and celebrate themselves publicly. Is this in a way a sort of career advice? It's a mixture of things. Fuck being humble is a mantra. It's a mindset. It's a belief that I want people to embrace so that anytime they're going into an opportunity, a career defining moment, a conversation, a meeting, and they catch themselves saying, I can't do this. I'm not good enough they say fuck being humble I can do this so at the very top level it's a way of looking at yourself and looking out to the world and how you want to portray yourself on a literal actionable level it's obviously a book where I offer advice I deliver talks and workshops where I create in-person experiences and I share a lot of content online to give daily kind of recommendations and advice that people can benefit from.

7:14In particular, in those talks and those coaching sessions, I think when you are trying to change someone's behavior, effectively you're touching someone's brain and that's very delicate. What do you think equips you to do this? So a big part of my, when I was at university, I studied a marketing degree and it was a communication and promotion. So for three years, we studied and looked at the best ways to communicate to people. Part of my dissertation I looked at was behavioural change. So I studied the way that different businesses and brands had done it. One example that I often come to is the Unilevers, five levers of change.

7:58They recommend five different ways that you can encourage behaviour change. And that can be anything from make it easy, make it understandable, make it desirable and they give a list of different recommendations on how to use that model and implement it throughout so that was the very first point of learning researching and understanding behavior change at the beginning then I went to work in a range of different businesses throughout my creative career and some of them were small startups where we were looking at hosting workshops that were all about personal branding, storytelling. How do we get people to create company cultures that people want to be part of?

8:39How do we bring people into the conversation? So in my first ever job, I was hosting these live workshops with teams. So I'd been trained by my boss, who at the time was also an author and had done a lot of work in this space of marketing, behavior change and culture change. And then the more I went into my advertising career, you know, studying, observing, working with creative people, working with writers, art directors, people that have successfully worked on campaigns and programs. And then I guess as a self-taught individual, I have read so many personal development books. I only read personal development books over the years, listen to thousands of podcasts.

9:19I live, breathe, eat this world. Like I soak it all up all the time. and I guess the final thing is like the school of life right like my own lived experiences and I actually think that's what people resonate the most with is when I tell people to fuck being humble and go out there and self-promote unapologetically I do that with integrity because I do it myself I am not someone who was handed a trust fund by my parents and said just go make a fun idea and turn it into a book. And I'm not someone that started with a ton of contacts and I walked into the creative industry having this easy breezy life.

10:00When I moved to London, I knew no one. I knew six university friends, but I had no network whatsoever. And over the last seven years of living in the city, I have worked so hard to build up this incredible network to show up for other people, support people, be someone who really activates and works in communities to have that network and to have that support. And so everything I do and everything I recommend, I have most likely tried, failed or succeeded from the advice that I'm giving. And that the book was the best example of that really, where it was, I joke, it was almost like me writing my diary publicly I joke it's a bit like Bridget Jones's diary it's it's a career book but it's me just reflecting on every form of self-promotion that has worked hasn't worked things that I watched that other people did that didn't work and things that can work for you and so for me it's a combination of my learned experience on the job but also my real life examples of how I have self-promoted and how I've observed other people doing it in a way that other people could emulate or learn from.

11:13Let's say that I'm not confident at work and I want to build up my confidence. Am I going to get the same results if I go to a therapist in comparison if I perhaps attend your talks or your coaching sessions or even read your book? So what's really interesting about that question is I've been to therapy myself and therapists are brilliant at asking open questions and getting you to reflect on what that experience has taught you, what you've been through. What I've noticed and who I am as an individual is when I go, when I went to therapy, I learned and observed and connected the docs very quickly and actioned things immediately.

12:04that is inherently who I am as an individual. I will go to a talk, I will be inspired by something and I'll be starting a business idea that day or I'll be launching a new product. I don't need a lot to move from insight to action. When you go to therapy, it's a lot of open-ended questions but you still have to go do the work. And I think the difference with Fuck Being Humble is I help suggest the actions on what you can do. so if anyone knows me or anyone's in my life if they come to me with a problem I have a really hard job of that just active listening you know that question where they say do you want advice or do you just want to be comforted I have to regularly ask that to the people that are speaking to me because my natural nature is to go into action advice problem solving and in fact when I worked full-time someone said Steph is brilliant at putting out fires before you even realize they're happening.

13:00And that proactivity is just innate in me as an individual. I have observed just how much that is not the case for everyone else. So what I think Fuck Being Humble offers as a platform, a community, a book, a resource is a list of recommendations that can help people move from inaction to action. All right. So let me summarize this to see if I got it wrong. Yeah, I got it right. So if I go to therapy, I am effectively giving these open questions so I can find myself the answer. I guess my immediate reaction to that would be that the therapist wants me to find the answer because then I am more likely to absorb it and to implement it and believe it.

13:48Then what you're doing with fuck being humble and i'll try to say this uh few words uh without uh laughing during the the podcast but um effectively what you're trying to do with fuck being humble is telling people what to do rather than for them to think what might be best for them so you're giving them a specific advice this is what will work trust me and do it i would say what they can do, not what they should do. So there's a, I think a point of difference there, which is, I think you've understood it. Yeah, exactly what I was saying. I think with, with therapists, you can go to therapy and they can say, well, let's look at your lack of confidence.

14:32Why don't you speak up at work? Well, because when I was at home, people, whenever I did speak up, people told me to be quiet or that my opinion wasn't right. And how did that make you feel? It made me feel worthless. It didn't make me feel great. And is that the case for every room you're in? no it's not so should you always feel that no right so you've got to the root cause and then the therapist is like okay see you have a nice day right you're still sat the problem with therapy traditional forms of therapy and i'm talking mainly about talking therapy because i know there's different types of therapy yeah you you come to a conclusion as to why you are the way you are but therapists aren't usually allowed to or encouraged to give the recommendations on what to do next why not i think it's just part of their practice i'm not a trained therapist so i don't know the exact rules but that's why people go to business coaches because coaches are more encouraged to give those recommendations so I think with fuck being humble whether you've been to therapy or not it's you don't I don't mind how you land on our channels or our content but what I am offering is a range of examples on how and lots of people can show up what I'm very explicit about saying is I don't think there's a right or wrong to self-promotion I don't think the way that you self-promote is better than the way I do I think everybody needs to have their own version I say it's a bit like a recipe list you've got to pick the ingredients from what you like from other people's self-promotion or your own personal brand or what you're trying to do and build your your own version of what that looks like so rather than saying it's what you should do it's it's more here are the options of what you can do if you want to take actions to move forward let's talk about being humble i was raised around some specific traits or values and one of them especially perhaps coming from my grandmother was the importance of being humble And it's interesting because out of every other value that my family has tried to teach me, this is the value that I try to keep most present in my life, especially during moments of success.

16:48But you're actively campaigning against this. I mean, literally, the title of your book is Fuck Being Humble. Why? I think everyone at some point in their life could think of a moment where they let modesty get in the way of an opportunity and you may not in this moment but the audience that the book and the business usually attracts is women and women are usually told to play small stay quiet there's not room for everyone there's lots of narratives around women not being as encouraged or not having the same role models as men to really show up maybe they don't have the capacity maybe they're doing other things that women are expected to do that mean they don't have the capacity to actually show up in their full way and every time I say this especially to a female audience I see people nodding like yeah I can absolutely think of a time where I stayed quiet when I should have spoke up but is that because they were humble because they've been told that the only way to success is to be humble so I absolutely believe in being humble like full disclosure for any listeners of course I do so if you say today you know this podcast went really well you were great I'm not gonna be like I know I'm amazing you know that is not the the way I would act at all I would say thank you so much.

18:20That means a lot. And I really appreciate you inviting me on the podcast. I respect your journey. You know, I am absolutely a humble person, but what I hate to see is people being so modest that they miss out on opportunities. So there are a lot of people who take the saying to be humble so literally that they never advocate. Can you give me an example? A really good example I can give is, let's say you work on a market store and you're selling fruit and vegetables. When you walk past that market store, the majority of the time, those people are saying, come get your three apples for five pounds, come get your bananas.

19:06because they don't have the luxury to not self-promote, right? They have to put themselves out there. If they sat back and said, my fruit's the best in town, or I'm just going to be humble in this moment, I'm just going to be modest, I'm going to stay quiet, they wouldn't get those people coming to them. And I think what we have is a slight disconnection where we believe you have to put yourself out there first in order to reach the success, in order to be humble, is my belief. Because you can be humble throughout your journey, of course, but that saying, clothes mouths don't get fed, is a very true phrase.

19:50So unless somebody else is advocating for you, unless you have a door opening for you, unless someone else is doing that work for you, you could very easily get lost in a sea of people because we're all too busy being humble because we're told that the key to success is to be humble and if we look at the Kardashians for example one of the most successful families in the world I don't think being humble is a word you would link to that family but they're extremely successful now I'm not putting them on the you know gold podium of the best ways to act and perform. But what I am encouraging people to think about is when they think about self-promotion, when they think about showing up, has there ever been a time where you wish you hadn't have taught yourself down, where you wish you hadn't have stayed quiet, undersold yourself, minimized yourself, overlooked yourself or felt overlooked?

20:52And if that has ever happened, I want you to fuck being humble in your next situation and I want you to go for that thing that's really the core it is not to create an army of arrogant people like that is not the setup at all and I try to do a lot of my work with humility with grace with an approach that is likable I was actually got a conference recently with someone and I noticed part of my success with this business and with this is my ability to be gracious in moments and is my emotional intelligence to read the room and read people when it comes to talking about successes. However, there was another person that I was with who was just talking about themselves, only talking about their successes, dominating conversations.

21:44It felt very self-indulgent. And actually that was a difference of this person wasn't being humble, but what they were missing was that emotional intelligence to read other people in the room. So I think when you are being less humble and you are advocating for yourself, you are celebrating your moment, it also is important that you're observing the people in the room. I mean, my understanding is that you're trying to make people act for them not to stay in their comfort zone and... do whatever you think is right or whatever your heart is telling you to do. Now, my question, and this is where I'm perhaps challenging you, is this really coming from people being humble?

22:31Like, someone can be shy. Someone can be uncertain about perhaps what to say in a given situation, in a business meeting or in a Q &A session in one of your talks. Like, is this related to being humble in most cases? Is that what you've seen? The people that come to fuck being humble. Yeah. So I put out a message and people are drawn into the message. So the people that attend my events, read my book. Yes, they are people who have felt at some point they have let modesty get in the way of what they are capable of doing. they they you know that's what they've come to my community for so I'm not I know there are people that are affected by this and a part of that is because they feel they need to show up in a certain way so when I say the words fuck being humble I watch their eyes light up I watch their body change I watch them feel like they've got the permission to go post that success on LinkedIn and that's the type of people that come to my audience.

23:41There may be people who are just shy and that might need a different community, that might need a different message. But the confidence that is evoked in those three words definitely uplift people to take up more space. I was very much looking forward to this episode and this conversation because throughout my career I've very much always tried to be humble in the way that I express myself towards people that I know and towards people that I don't know. And I've done this for two reasons. And I'd like to know if you agree with this reason. So the first reason why I actively try to be as humble as possible is because the moment I feel that I am very accomplished or successful, I get this feeling of entitlement.

24:36And when I have this feeling of entitlement, it doesn't allow me to see or analyze the situation objectively. And then my emotions could be all over the place and effectively, that's going to impact my decision making. So that's one reason why I try to basically bring myself down to earth and humble myself. And then on the other hand, in my particular case, I'm 28 years old, right? So I am young and I've been blessed and I'm incredibly grateful to life that I was, I am able to, to live a level of perhaps I would even say financial success due to my hard work and so on, that most likely the majority of other people that are my age are not able to, or are not living it right now.

25:27So when I'm in settings where I'm with friends that are my age and they have a slightly different career path, I really try to think and be conscious and to tone down what I say of what I've done today or perhaps what's the next milestone that my company is going to achieve? Because perhaps even though for me, it's just speaking about my day-to-day activities and it may look like as a one-off thing that I am doing, this milestone might not be very big in the grand scheme of the things that I'm doing. Perhaps for them, it's something very big and it might make them feel smaller. And this is something that I really, really don't want.

26:06and I try to actively think on what I am saying, especially in these more social settings. I don't want to make anyone feel bad. Which is great. That's a really brilliant skill to have. But when you're going into meetings with investors or you're going into career-defining meetings, you're not in that same mindset because you're having to impress them. But the people that I help have it so ingrained in their head that they shouldn't ever promote themselves. They shouldn't ever promote their successes. Even in performance reviews or, you know, interviews and stuff, it's like, how do I self-promote in an interview?

26:48People are worried about promoting themselves in an interview. You can't get the job unless you promote yourself, right? And so I think what you have is brilliant emotional intelligence skills to not overbear people with your successes. And I think that's I do the same. There are situations where I may not talk about the peaks of my successes. In fact, when I start every talk at Fuck Being Humble, I don't reel off every success I've had. I don't open with the fact that I'm a TEDx speaker, Forbes under 30, my book sold 10 ,000 copies. Plus, like, I don't open my presentations by listing out my CV.

27:29Because I want everyone in the room to feel like this time that they're spending is about them. And I want the advice I give to prove my worth. I don't need my credentials to do that. I know when to dial up and dial down my self-promotion. Not everyone knows when to dial it up. Most people are used to dialing it down. What are the benefits of being confident? Can you list them? I think you live a life more optimistically so the more inner confidence you have I actually met a woman yesterday in a hotel lobby and we got talking about work and she said that she she flicks between full-time work and freelance work and I said how do you handle that in terms of clients and work coming in do you ever get worried and she said I believe good things are are always going to happen for me.

28:23And when she said that, I said, do you always think that? She said, yeah, I carry this mindset that I believe good things are going to happen for me. And it sounds so simple, but I get the feeling she wakes up every day and she tells herself that, and she has been telling herself that because she has that abundance mindset, right? And when you moves through life with confidence, you think more things are possible. So you are more open to try new things. You're more likely to say yes. You are more likely to put yourself forward for things that you've never tried. You are more likely to help others.

29:02You're more likely to be present as well. I think when we're less confident, we are often questioning how other people see me, what are people thinking about my outfit? What are people thinking? I know if I walk in and I am wearing something or I feel my most centered confidence health, I'm not worrying about the external validation. I know I can be fully present with people. And whether that is present delivering work, present with people, present with your family, growing confidence allows you to have that contentment in the present moment rather than feeling like when I get to this point I will be happy in this moment.

29:43Let's talk about that confidence when it comes to clothing and fashion. I've heard in a lot of people that if you dress up the part, if you dress nicely, if you buy nice clothes it can help you boosting your confidence but at the same time I've also I've listened to a lot of podcasts that they basically say the opposite thing they're basically saying that confidence is something that happens within so it's it's internal and you cannot achieve real confidence with external factors with materials that are external to you what do you think it's such an interesting question because i i i agree i think it can work both ways for me personally i know if i'm wearing something i feel great in and i feel good in myself i feel good in my skin my body my hair feels right all of those things yeah i'm going to do a better job i just categorically know that and when i've not felt comfortable in the clothing I'm wearing.

30:49Let's say my dress feels a bit tight or maybe I have felt like my hair's not in the right place or whatever it may be. I don't deliver as well because my mind is preoccupied on those external factors. That being said, I know someone in my network who follows the Steve Jobs uniform of she only ever wears black and her whole uniform is black and I'm quite jealous of her in a way because the mental capacity she will have the extra time she has to think about other things where she's not worrying about wardrobe like I would say one of my daily stresses is what am I going to wear today and how do I make sure that I feel present and great I think it comes down to a few things fashion for me is a form of self-expression fuck being humble is a form of self-expression so if I turned up in an all black outfit I wouldn't feel like I'm expressing myself well because that's not an expression of who I am I love to wear bright colors you'll always see me in a colorful outfit so it's actually a form of internally representing myself externally so for me styling myself and having that as part of my brand absolutely affects my confidence and it makes me feel better on stages.

32:07I spoke at a conference in Portugal last week and I had this red, silky, long flowing dress. And I knew that if I'd have worn it all day, I would have sat down, I would have creased in it. I had to get to the conference at 9am, but I wasn't speaking till four o 'clock. And I knew I was worried that I might spill a drink down it, although I'm quite a clumsy person. And so I decided to wear a very casual outfit to the conference and take it as an outfit change and I was worrying that I might look a bit like a diva like who am I to have an outfit change I'm not a celebrity but what it made me but fuck being humble but what it made me do was be present so I wasn't worrying about my outfit like I said my focus was just about listening to the other speakers when people spoke to me about their events if people nudged into me I wasn't worried that they were you know going to spill a drink on me whatever it was and then when I changed into my red dress for my moment I felt a psychological shift I genuinely felt this like stage presence there's a really good TED talk where a guy talks about the fact that he's a pro wrestler um a semi-pro wrestler so he works normally but then when he steps into the ring he has to dial up his confidence and I believe that to be true for moments in our careers that there are certain things that we have to do to dial up our confidence and I think for me fashion is one of them.

33:27I agree with you 100%. I think, and I've seen this in myself, right? So I don't think you can be the same person in every setting, right? So there is, in my case, for example, Alberto, in this case, the podcaster, but then there's Alberto, the entrepreneur, when I'm in my business, then there's Alberto, perhaps the friend that is doing a boys night, Alberto, to the boyfriend. So for every different occasion, I think I can perform better if my outfit is more suited for that. Because I consider that every outfit that you have is a uniform that could be paired to a very specific situation. For example, if I'm wearing a suit, I'm going to feel more corporate, mature, professional.

34:15So perhaps my body language or even the way I say things might unconsciously be more in line with that persona, with that uniform. But if I am going and I dress up for a birthday party that is in Soho in a suit, I might bring to an environment a version of Alberto that is not applicable or that might not be, let's say, as suited for whatever is happening in Soho. But if I go more boho style, you know, a little bit more oversized with my clothes, I have seen and I have felt in myself that I can behave slightly different. I'm still myself, but it's a different version of myself. So I do believe that clothing is incredibly important to bring a side of yourself.

35:06It could be a more creative side. It could be a more professional corporate side. And at least to me, I say the effect immediately. So clothing is incredibly important. I'd also add to that on the flip side, if you only ever wear casual clothes and tracksuits or, you know, joggers or whatever that might be, and that's how you want to show up on stages or at podcasts, then also be authentic to that. The point is not that when you're stepping into a boardroom, you have to wear a suit. It ultimately, it's like what clothing evokes the emotion you want to feel in that space, I think is the most important thing.

35:42And that for everyone is individual and different. And that's why I think fashion is so great because it is a form of self-expression in that way. You're clearly very good at storytelling. I mean, when you were sharing the story of you being in Portugal and perhaps maybe sleeping something over your dress, I was imagining you in that specific moment. In your own words, can you describe to me what is storytelling and why is this important? So storytelling, I would often link back to like narratives, which is thinking about when you're not in the room, what is the thing that people might say or associate with you?

36:22So that's why I believe storytelling is important. For me personally, I think storytelling is like the vehicle to connecting people and making information more accessible. So with Fuck Being Humble, whether you like it or loathe it, I'm okay with that. What I know is I have bridged a gap between people who may not have ever picked up a career book to people, to a piece of content that is now going to help them evolve and grow. And for me, that is like the most rewarding work I can do is to take an audience who feel they need something they're missing that support and to be able to curate something that allows them to benefit from the education or the learning.

37:13When I was growing up as I said I didn't feel that smart and one of the things I interviewed someone recently and they said that they teach children with learning disabilities, how to get higher grades at school. I said, amazing, how do you do that? And he said, well, I turn the curriculum into a song and I get them to practice the song, remember the song. They sing the song when they're brushing their teeth. They sing it when they wake up and they go from lower grades to A stars and A's. And I was so touched by that because what I thought was so incredible was that storytelling. They have taken a textbook that is printed, quite boring, not very engaging, and added storytelling to enable a group of people to succeed.

38:00And that's why I think I'm so passionate about this is because I love to break down those barriers. I like to make information more accessible. And another community that I started, which is a little bit on pause, in and out. And I guess that's just a part of being an entrepreneur and running multiple businesses and having lots of ideas is a community called This Might Help, which is aims to support people who are helping others with mental health struggles, because I have helped a lot of people with mental health in my life, but I never had anyone helping me. And I didn't really know where to get advice, what that looked like.

38:37And the reason I was so passionate about starting this was because there's a group of people that need support. There isn't the content there. But if we tell a nice story that connects them to it, they may feel like they have that space and they have that community. So I think storytelling is a vehicle to connect people to information that they may not have access to or the way the information's been presented so far doesn't connect with them. Let's deep dive into the people that you've helped through career your advices, talks, workshops, coaching sessions. Can you describe this person to me?

39:18So how old is this person? You've said that it's mostly female. What is it that they do? Are they entrepreneurs? Are they employees? So just to note on the mostly female, women are drawn and instantly connect to the message. I think men naturally have a little bit more reservations. But. Why? Because they, as I said, the way that women are treated when it comes to sharing successes publicly, women have traditionally been criticized more. They're known as braggy, boastful, bossy, too assertive. There's a lot of language that gets carried around when women are confident in themselves that it's not well received.

40:05men often feel they don't need my message they already have social acceptance they already know how to prove themselves all of those things but I deliver a lot of corporate talks I deliver a lot of employee training a lot of talks to companies and there are so many men that come up to me afterwards going you know I didn't think I needed this but you've just shared some really great strategies and techniques and tools and I really like I really thank thank you for that and there's also a really interesting conversation around when you type in imposter syndrome, all that comes up is women. And I do not believe for one minute that men don't experience imposter syndrome.

40:47But the way the culture and the media and society tell stories is that women need to do more to better themselves, improve themselves, whereas men are generally just doing an all right job. so what I'm really happy with with regards to my audience and the people that I teach is the message almost instantly and immediately connects with women because they have often felt they need to be quieter they need to play small they are not the priority in the conversation so that's women of all ages so that can be women who are late 60s who have messaged me to be like god I I wish I had your book 30 years ago, you would have helped me in my career.

41:29That could be women who are 40s, middle management, trying to get to that next level, but they're in a male dominated environment and they're struggling to push through. That could be people who are in an internship and they really want to make a good impression, but they're not sure how they can do that because they maybe don't feel the best in the room, but what do they, what can they say and do to add value. So on that side, there's lots of different factors. On the men's side, yeah, I've been really interested to see how many creative people come to my space. So a lot of people who are creative are in the industry because they're creative.

42:07They care about making art. They care about writing books. What they don't really want to have to do is marketing, is promotion, is sales, because they've been fed a narrative of if you work hard, you'll go far, which is another thing that I kind of question because there's so many people that work really hard and don't go far. And that's why the message resonates with people. When you say fuck being humble, you're right, right. Yeah, maybe I need to be less humble and tell people more about what I do so I can go further because everybody else seems to be doing that. So I know it's a lot of creative people come to me because their desire and their passion and their purpose is to create.

42:43But in order for them to be successful they need to then sell their creations or they need to then be able to get themselves into rooms so they're looking for that guidance and support on how to take it to the next level and then I have a lot of business owners founders freelancers who they need to secure clients they want to pitch themselves they want to feel more comfortable at work I have a lot of students so I do guest lecturing so I go to a lot of universities because I believe if we can help to limit imposter syndrome or reduce it or change the narrative about it at the earlier stages it may not be as much of a problem as we go through our careers.

43:17Studies have shown that the gender pay gap starts as soon as people graduate. So men will ask for the higher end of the salary bracket and women will ask for the lower end. So right from the ages of 21, men start to get paid more than women. So I believe if I can go in and I can teach, you know, especially women, but also men, because it's not, it is for everyone involved, however you identify if we can teach people at an earlier point in their careers or their lives how to promote themselves how to communicate their value how to negotiate how to network they will see better successes the the hardest thing I hear is when people say to me I wish I'd have heard from you sooner because that moment for me tells me they've missed out on something that they really deserved.

44:10All right, I'm going to give you an imaginary client. Sure. Imagine that this client is in his or her gender agnostic in his or her mid-30s. And this person works in a job that requires for him or her to deliver a lot of speeches. Internal to other colleagues, but also perhaps something external too. what are the basics the keys do's and don'ts for this person when it comes to public speaking so I've recently launched a one-to-one coaching service on public speaking where I give exactly this advice how do you get stage ready is is the title of the the package that I offer and the way that I work with people is at the very core we talk about what's the ambitions of the session?

45:04What are we trying to achieve with this? Are you trying to get a TED talk? Are you trying to impress your boss? Are you trying to get investor buy-in? What are we trying to do before we even step into the room? Because that will affect how you build a presentation. So if you are trying to get people to join you in an environmental rally and riot, we need to be talking about the urgency is now, you know, we need more people to work together. do you want to see this planet continue for the rest of time you know so we'll be looking at bigger bolder statements we'll be looking at inclusive questions we'll be thinking of ways to pull on heartstrings or you know so versus you're going into a meeting with an investor and this investor maybe cares more about ROI numbers how are you going to get to this point show me your A to B plan you know and in that case it may be more factual or it may be more figures based.

46:01Still want to get them excited and we still want to sell them a dream, but they're two quite different experiences we want to create in the room. So the first point I always recommend people to think about is what is the intention of this presentation? What do we want people to do more or less of? And that's the question I ask my clients when they book me for a talk. I say, you know, what's the vibe in the room? Have there been redundancies? Have there been layoffs? Do people feel happy? Has there been a change in management? So understanding what the environment is that you're going into and what the intention is before you start building a presentation is so important because it's going to change the way that you tell a story.

46:39It's going to change the questions you're going to ask. It might change the imagery you include. It might change the keywords you put on the slide. So that those things are important to start with. The second thing that I recommend is I personally, I go very basic, but I'll just get a pen and a paper and I'll put the topic in the middle and I will just do a spider diagram of all the different things in relation to that topic. So I'm about to launch a new talk called Progress, not perfection. And so I need to make my talk and I will put in the middle, when have I let, you know, perfection stop me?

47:13And I'll start thinking about, okay, well, there was, when I got the book opportunity, I said no originally because... It's a beautiful sentence, progression, not perfection. Yeah, that's what I want to encourage more. And, you know, when I got the book opportunity, I told myself I couldn't do it because who was I? You know, I wasn't that big a deal. But fuck being humble. But fuck being humble. And what I told myself and what I was worried about was that I wasn't an expert yet. So I was worried nobody had said, you're good at writing. You're a Nobel Prize winner. You're worthy of this. So I didn't believe it.

47:48So I just did nothing. And I said, thanks, but no thanks, no hunger. And then what I started to think about was like, well, what would this look like? And so when I'm thinking about talks, I will start with a very simple list out every possible advice you've heard, a quote that I've heard, song lyrics that remind me of progress, not perfection, real stories of celebrities that show themselves in a progress way versus being perfect. But, you know, I will really stretch the concept as wide as possible, but I do it on pen and paper first. Because when we go to a screen, we're looking at a blank presentation and we're like, right, let the magic happen.

48:27It doesn't happen that way, right? So I find it really helpful to be off digital screens and really let my mind wander and think about all the different things that I would want to put into this presentation. So I would recommend that for people who are thinking about them. and then I think one of the best things you can do with a presentation is create something unexpected so I go to lots of events I observe a lot of people's talks and and get inspiration I went to a TED talk where somebody was talking about environmental issues and they were specifically talking about our use around electricity and overusing it and mid-presentation in front of a crowd of about 700 people it was TEDx London they cut out all the lights the screens cut and the guy got a lighter and just put the light in front of his face and finished the rest of his presentation only being lit by a lighter and it was like goosebumps like it was like nothing you'd seen and I am still talking about it three years later so it may not always be appropriate to turn off the lights and cut the power and put a lighter in front of your face but thinking about how when you're creating a presentation experience, is there any way you can make it feel unexpected and memorable?

49:44Because we've all been in meetings, right? Where we've watched the same status updates, we've watched pitch decks, and it's the same thing. It's the same format, it's the same delivery. And what I think people love about Fuck Being Humble presentations is... The title. The title, which by the way, once you get into my presentations, I don't swear. I really only swear at the title point. But I create funny visuals and references. So when I talk about networking, I compare it to dating on Bumble. And I say, when you match someone on Bumble, you don't ask them to marry you on the first time you match because you look slightly strange, right?

50:18When you're networking, you don't just ask for a thousand pounds. You don't ask for a job on the spot because you have to start DMing them like you would on a dating app. And what I think people love is the unexpected way that I tell stories that people remember that are linked to cultural references or things that they can connect to, but that they'll go away and speak about. And I went to an event last night where this woman was delivering a presentation and she is an artist and she wanted to promote her work and she was. And one of the things she did was, you know, you get pop-up banners that are like, here's a special offer, here's a special.

50:57she popped up banners with discount codes to her products and her website throughout the presentation. And it was this really tongue in cheek self-promotion of like, here's another discount code, by the way, if you didn't get it the last time, here's another discount code. And throughout her presentation, she kept surprising the audience. She kept making the audience laugh. She kept telling stories with unexpected twists. And she was hands down the best speaker and both me and my partner he said the same he was like she was incredible and when we really thought about it was because we didn't know what was coming next so if you can think of a way to create an unexpected moment it will always help to have people still talking about you after that presentation so three things first one understand your environment second one you're going to be more innovative if you don't use digital devices and then the third one try to impress people do something different so you can be memorable and one final thing i'd say on the actual public speaking and delivery no one ever knows what you're about to say so if you mess up just don't let on that you have i probably mess up in every single talk that i give but the audience doesn't know just a quick one from me we're very proud to partner with born bound an innovative sports It's a parallel brand.

52:20And when I choose my workout gear, I look at three things. Number one, it has to look good because it helps me stay motivated. Number two, it needs to feel incredibly light, almost like I'm not wearing anything. And number three, it has to breathe and dry very fast. Born Bound nails it at all of this. We've secured an amazing offer. Use the code that we're going to leave here below for you to get 30 % off Born Bound gear. I hope you take advantage of it and you unlock the best version of yourself. That's it from me. Now, we both need to get back to the episode. Thank you. You keep using and mentioning the words self-promotion.

52:58In very simple terms, what is it and why does it matter? When you break down what self-promotion means, self means I, and promotion is just an activity that supports an aim or a goal. No reason to feel arrogant or awkward for doing it. Self-promotion is just the story you tell about your successes. about your achievements, about your wins. And actually, I think if we dig a bit deeper, it's not necessarily just about your successes. I think self-promotion can be about your lived experiences and about who you are as an individual. So I went to a conference recently where Nahal Youssefian spoke and she has been the head of HR at Netflix and lots of other big companies.

53:42and she actually talked about how our unique skills can be found if we look at the things we've been through in life not our careers she talked about the fact she was an immigrant so as an immigrant it meant she was aware a lot of the time she would stand up for things she believed in and she encouraged the audience to do the same and I actually did a post on this on Fuck Bing Hummel's Instagram and I'd encourage everyone to go have a look at it I went through this and I reflected on what have I been through in life that have created my unique skills so work aside what have I been through so my parents divorced when I was young which meant I had to learn quite quickly how to read rooms and people I have helped a lot of people with mental health as I mentioned so I am a big empath I care a lot about making other people feel valued so that they know that they're needed and wanted on this earth.

54:42I have moved a lot, moved around a lot. So I definitely didn't have one home my entire life and we moved different cities, countries. So I love adapting and connecting with people. And the reason I give this example is this isn't about my successes. These are about hard life experiences that have born or birthed my unique skills. and I shared that the other day as an example and everything I share is advice but also it's a piece of self-promotion so I was sharing this example encouraging my audience to go and do it but I was also showcasing the unique skills I have without talking about my successes so the reason I expanded on that is because self-promotion we often believe is only about talking about our success and our achievements but self-promotion you could be offering free advice every week and that is a form of self-promotion you could be doing a podcast every week and that is a form of self-promotion you could be writing a newsletter and that's a form of self-promotion you're not always talking about your successes it's about doing things that raise your visibility in spain and perhaps this is only related to the more socially known form of self-promotion which is talking about yourself or your successes but in spain when you when you speak to other friends about yourself or or your achievements the direct translation is basically they tell you don't you have a grandmother what basically that means is that is usually the grandmother that speaks very highly about the grandchild oh my grandchild has done this or that and he just accomplished whatever but you don't do that yourself to yourself about yourself right um so this is something that at least in spain we grew up with and we really try to avoid should i be avoiding it should i because it's really in me right now I mean, I grew up with it.

56:50My question back to you is, is your grandmother in every room that you need her to be? Thank God, no. No. Now, I also have a similar grandmother. Well, I love my grandmother so much. My grandparents, like, they adore me. And they, my sister and my family, and they are the most supportive, cheerleading. You know, they, I can't step into their house with that. It's the biggest confidence boost is going to their house because they're so sweet and celebratory. but my grandma is not there in my investment chats or in my interviews or in my pitch proposals and so whilst it's great to grow that inner confidence if you don't have that hype woman or that hype girl or that hype man cheerleading you in those moments then that only accounts for the inner self-belief and again what we talked about earlier is even if your grandparents are saying how brilliant you are you have to believe that you have to be going to communicate that or someone else does on behalf of you.

57:50But if they're not in the room with you, you have to learn how to communicate that. So in answer to how do you respond to that, I would say I do have a grandmother, but she's not in the room when I need her to be to promote me and get me the successes. And I'd love to hear what your friend's responses are to that. I mean, definitely, I know my grandmother's response. Her response would be, I would love to be in the room. I'll come with you. Yeah, exactly. Just invite me over. So then according to this, at least new to me, definition of what self-promotion is, is this something that I should do or onboard as a lifestyle?

58:32Or is self-promotion a tool that I should be using in very specific situations, like the one you said, perhaps if I'm pitching to a new investor? it's it's difficult for me to answer without a lot of passion on why I think it's more of a lifestyle thing so I was in a taxi the other day and within seven minutes the taxi driver bought my book and I wasn't getting in a taxi to pitch my book to the taxi driver but he said where have you been and I was like I was at an event I was I was at an event he's like oh what we what was the event about and I was like I was actually speaking at the event what was the what were you speaking about fuck being humble and he was like tell me more and within minutes this guy was buying the book I'll probably never see him again but he's now a fuck being humble customer right and I guess what I've learned along the way is And it's very easy for us to, I believe a lot in work-life balance.

59:36so what I'm not expecting you to do is to spend every minute of your day self-promoting of course but some of my best interactions and moments have come from self-promoting I got a fiance through self-promoting so I was in a park and I met my now fiance um did you propose to him no although I might as well have he at seven years ago we met in a park at a friend's birthday and he told me that he worked in product design. And I said, I work in video content and TV production. If you're ever looking for video content, here's my business card. And that sounds wild to be giving a business card on a Saturday in a park, like not my coolest move, you know, like it was quite corporate, quite professional to be doing that.

1:00:28I genuinely gave him the business card for content purposes. And a few weeks later, he messaged me and was like, we should grab a drink. And we've been together and he proposed last year and we're getting married in a couple of years. Congratulations. Thank you. And the reason I say share that is not because I think self-promotion will get you a romantic partner. Can it help you in relationships? Depends who you're with. So my fiance is probably the most supportive person I know and he is like my number one hype man and is so proud of everything I do and is incredibly supportive from the outset.

1:01:08And I'm very fortunate to have a man in my life that is like that because not everyone has the capacity to show that appreciation and pride. So this means you don't need to sort of promote yourself in the relationship because you're with this specific type of person. Yeah, I'm with someone who I could not be successful and they still really care and appreciate and love me. But I do also know that I'm fortunate to have met someone that respects the work that I do and the message that I put out to the world and doesn't try to minimise me and doesn't try and put me in a box, which some relationships can lead to that.

1:01:48but with regards to self-promotion and whether it needs to be a daily activity or whether it is something that's ingrained in you whether it's a professional thing as we said you know I think what you gave the example was really nice earlier about when I'm around certain friends I know to dial it down and I think that's a really respectful thing to do but I also don't want you to miss out on certain situations or opportunities because you downplayed things. So I think it's about finding ways to talk about your successes in a way that is quite inclusive. So, you know, it might be that you're like, oh yeah, work's been really good.

1:02:28We just landed this deal, but gosh, it's really burnt me out. I felt so exhausted getting to this point. You know, it's a bit of a weird feeling because I'm happy we've got there, but it's the most exhaustive I've ever been. That's a very different tone to, I've just got the biggest deal I've ever got. I'm so proud of me. Let's have shots, you know? So I think there's ways. Is that second thing wrong? Because while my logical brain would tell me it can be wrong because you might be hurting other people, people that are around you. But my emotional brain is telling me, be proud. Not not only be proud but this is the truth why should you hide the truth so i think it's important to have to a group of people that you can unapologetically promote and celebrate with and that is the secret and that's the thing that i've been so fortunate with is i have my partner who you know if i win a big project he's like right let's go for dinner it's his recommendation before it's mine i have friends who are like i hope you know like how proud i am of you like i have a lot of friends who are emotionally able to give that support and I have yeah family member you know my dad's very supportive you know he will often send gushing texts about how proud he is and things like that I have those things because I am that person to other people so my sister recently bought a house and she was like I'm so excited about the house and I was like oh my god it's amazing she's like I'm so happy you said that because like I showed this person and I was like you're joking you finally got a house I'm so happy for you blah blah blah and that happened a few different people throughout that week said I love sharing news with you and I was like why and they were just like because you make me feel excited about it because you make me celebrate it even when I don't think it needs celebrating so I think two things absolutely go find that group of people that you can celebrate with and you just get to buy shots to just be proud 100 % but also make sure you're doing that for other people because that is as important and I know not every group in my life I can celebrate my wins with some people I don't even talk about work with because when I talk about work I want people to feel that excitement with me and I feel like if they don't it's not worth me exposing myself to be disappointed so I'd rather protect myself from possible negative energy and celebrate with the people who I can guarantee will be really happy for me and that's what I think is really important is I think we can be a chameleon in different groups and we can you know certain people you might not want to brag as much in front of and brag I don't mean in a negative way I mean that and it's fine to brag about things if you're happy about them but certain people you can totally unapologetically because you know if they succeed you're going to be doing the same for them so I think it's so so important to find the groups of people that you can self-promote unapologetically with but also have that emotional intelligence like you already have to read the room and think about how you could share that success in an approachable way if you really do want to share it how could I land this in an inclusive way that doesn't make people feel like they're being left behind or that I'm better than them but I'm still able to share it with the people I care about throughout your work with fuck being humble have you come across especially in professional context have you come across the narrative which goes generally people want you to do well but not better than them so perhaps if you're not humble or if you are overconfident or in a way cocky seen as cocky it can be counterproductive especially in in in a professional setting yes absolutely so I've worked for people like that who I was a very ambitious you know high achiever.

1:06:42I want more. I want to do this. I want, I arguably I was quite annoying to manage. I can understand that now. And I've had people who are like, you're good. Just stay where you are. Like you don't need to be going that far. Look at that person. They're five years older than you and they're not even manager. And I was like, that's not my problem. They're just shit at what they do. Like I'm very good at what I do. I'm not going to slow myself down because he likes to be a time waster. Like that's not my problem. Right. So I had very hungry attitude, but I absolutely had people that were trying to hold me down and were trying to say, stay in your lane.

1:07:17Don't, don't go further. And so much of that, and honestly, female bosses, women were doing that, which the feminist in me gets quite frustrated that that was the case. But part of that reason I look back now is because there wasn't a lot of room for everyone. And when we hold people down, it's usually because we're worried that there's not enough room for us all to succeed. Like that's the worry. It's like, well, if you get that, I can't get that. Instead of looking at it as like, if you knock down that door, it's easier for me to go through next. Or if Steph managed to get that partnership, maybe I could, because we have quite similar skill sets.

1:07:55But instead it's like, oh, typical Steph got that partnership, right? And a bit like what you were saying earlier about people choose the narrative that suits them they might actually not want to take action so they prefer to complain or you know they don't want to push themselves to the next level but they definitely don't want you to overtake them right so a lot of these things we can't necessarily control but it's absolutely something that happens a lot and we have to be mindful of what should you do if you're in that specific environment so you're working for this company and unfortunately the work culture for this company is that they want you to do well, but never better than the person next to you.

1:08:37Should you move? Should you do something else? Leave the company? Should you work within the company and try to change that culture? I would exhaust all your options before you leave. So probably looking back, one of my mistakes was that I used to leave companies. As soon as I didn't get what I want, I'd be like, cool, I'm out the door. I don't need to wait around for this and I'd go get another job. That was very like I was a serial job hopper. So every 18 months I'd move to the next job. And now I look back, I could definitely have stayed in certain environments a little bit longer to see if things changed or move.

1:09:14I don't regret it because I'm here where I am and I love where I am. But I can see that I didn't exhaust all of my options. And I think if you love the work, if you love the company, if you love the vibe, then it's worth exploring that. My tip on that would be try and find a niche of your own that you can carve out that isn't about overtaking the person, but is about showing your value. So a good example of that is when I was working full time, I actually ran Fuck Being Humble as a side hustle for two and a half years. and I had done some events at my previous company, moved to my new company and they knew about being humble.

1:09:56So they knew I was doing events. And when I started talking about, you know, some of the things, people I was interviewing, some of the things I was doing, I actually asked my boss if I could host an exhibition in our office because we had a cool studio space. And he was like, you can do, but like, I'm not going to give you any more money and you're not getting like a pay rise and you know, you're not getting a promotion. I was like, no, no, it's fine. I just think I could add value to the company by hosting more events. We could invite our clients, we could create community. It's something I really enjoy.

1:10:27So it's, you know, giving me momentum. And he was like, okay, sure. But like, I'm not giving you any extra resources, like you go do it. Okay, so I put on my first ever exhibition, and it was around mental health. And it went really well like people came um it started conversations in the office people our clients attended we turned it into blog content it became this thing off the back of me hosting this event my colleagues then started talking about hosting events and the person they came to was me so they said they would be like oh Steph like I loved what you did in the studio like I'd love to host an event could we do it together and could we and I started to become this like internal events director, which at the time was a bit of a saving grace, I think, in my career, because I'd been doing the same thing for a while and I needed this like creative exploration as well.

1:11:20And so off the back of that, we ended up hosting events in Paris, New York, Cannes, Amsterdam, and I was taken to be the host of all of these events and all that. And that absolutely came from me going, I want to figure out a little bit more of a niche for myself. I want to bring some of my external skills in and I want to enjoy my job more. How can I do that? And I made a business case for it. I proved it worked. And then my career flourished even more so. So to answer your question, to think about how can we, how do we navigate those situations where we feel like someone saying stay down is try and find an alternative or a niche or something that isn't going to make them feel threatened so I wasn't trying to take my managing director's job absolutely not I just wanted to carve out something of my own that allowed me to flourish and grow and that was I think a really good example and then if you try all these things that's not right then move on like my thing is life is too short your mental health is the most important I was in the most toxic most horrendous job I've ever been in my first job in my career and I stayed in it for 11 months but if I'd have stayed in it any longer I wouldn't be here today I wouldn't have the confidence I have the person I worked for had the ability to completely crush everyone that they worked with extremely toxic unsafe unhealthy and I had that experience at 21 so I knew I would never ever be in an environment where I felt at risk or I felt unsafe or that I wasn't being valued comes back to this value thing and so my decision to move on regularly was because I had this a bit of a flight off like a survival mode reaction which is as soon as I felt like that I was out so I think like I said on reflection if you can try and make the situation work better first but if you realize things just aren't working, people are holding you going, you're not growing, you're not in the right space.

1:13:27You're not in the right environment. You're not around the right people. I used to live in Manchester and I loved it, but it wasn't brimming with ideas and innovators. It lacked the excitement and the energy and, you know, the contrast in thinkers. It felt very samey. And the minute I came to London, I was like, whoa, I feel alive. And I actually saw a video on TikTok the other day about your thrive city, about this idea of like, there's certain cities you go to where you think I can just thrive. And London was one of them for me. And New York is the next place that I'm building my business at the moment.

1:14:02And it's this place where I go to and I'm like, I could take on anything here. Like I am, it just makes me feel alive. And I think if spaces don't make you feel that way, look to move on. how can you tell when the work environment is toxic so in your case you were 21 and at some point you decided to move on because you weren't happy with your boss or the colleagues around you I've seen in friends and I can also safely say that I've seen this also in my partner in my girlfriend that when they feel they're in a toxic environment the first thing that they think of is does this have merit? Is this really toxic or am I maybe exaggerating?

1:14:44When do you know it's toxic and you say enough, it's enough, I need to move on? So I was in quite an extreme environment. So the manager that I worked for, he was the owner of the business. He had no HR and the turnover staff was solely about him and his behaviors. When I handed him my notice, he threw a book at me. When we would drive to meetings, he would be screaming in my face words like, you're not worth the air I breathe because I'd not bound a document together properly. So it was this extremely unacceptable environment. moment and he was he had a real toxic trait in the sense that he would also tell me I was like his protege and I was like he was like you're amazing you're great and then would just flip and be completely irrational and yeah just just not okay essentially and so that was quite an extreme place where it wasn't up for debate like that that isn't normal and the only sad thing for me was I was a graduate and that at that time we're going back like nearly 10 years ago now I was there was a conversation which is you need to stay in a job for 12 months two years to be taken seriously anywhere else and that I stayed in the job because of that mindset because of what other people told me and then when I went to interview for other jobs I got three job offers so it had nothing to do with being a graduate didn't matter didn't matter that I had 11 months experience so for me it was quite evident that it was it was toxic and I guess the signifier was I was crying every week like beyond Sunday scary it wasn't just Sunday scaries it was like multiple times during the week I was the lowest weight I'd ever been because I was going to the gym every single night to relieve the stress and I would come out and I'd be like the only way I can face going to work goes because I have to go to the gym and you know like it was it wasn't healthy did you need anyone that told you to quit or it was a self-personal decision well so what was interesting is when I started the company all the people that I like got on with they all left within six months and they obviously you know when you work at a company they don't want to taint the experience but I'm not stupid to know that the majority of the business left like there was a high turnover of staff there were only five people but everybody was leaving because and and often they would be quite public arguments and things that you would see so it wasn't even discreet the mistreatment of staff and so yeah I I think my mum was actually she has had some difficult periods in her career and she was very keen to get me out of the situation I think it was other people that were sort of like oh you need to stay in longer no one will take you seriously all of that but I think I just there must have been the turning point um but you know I think some people are scared when they hand in their notice but I was I was literally physically scared and them to be attacked essentially was just crazy behavior you know so yeah I think people often ask me about my confidence where did I get it where did I grow it all of those things and I would say I'm a naturally confident person if you spoke to my parents they'd say I was like putting on tv shows when I was like six and having my own chat show and all those things but these experiences have so built the resilience like sticking in that environment way longer than I needed to and the same for every job I went into there was always something that wasn't quite right it was mismanagement or yeah it generally came down to the managers um and then the next job I went to was it wasn't toxic but the boss would always claim my work as her own and everybody could see what was happening apart from her and when I handed in my notice she rejected my CV my resignation letter she pushed it back on the table and said I don't think you've thought about this and so it was these moments where I've just had too many of these moments in my career where I know I have a gut feeling now and I think gut feeling is based off experiences right and so I think when you're in these situations, my advice to people is get a notebook and write down everything because our minds can play tricks on us.

1:19:30When we feel low, we can say everything's terrible. When we feel good, we can say everything's great. I remember my mum said, get a notebook in your first job. And she said, if you fill that notebook with stories or things of what happened, how it made you feel before the year ends, you need to get out. And it was filled after three months. It was this, it was just like story after story after thing after thing that happened. It wasn't the odd bit of bad behavior. So that was having this notebook where I wrote down literally what happened. How did I respond? How did they respond? Very factually, not emotionally.

1:20:05It wasn't like a diary, a real notebook to track this. That was the first step. And then I guess this is why I often recommend people to always have an eye on the market as well, because as soon as I got those three interviews I was like oh right so it's got nothing to do the age as to how you present yourself and I guess that's why it comes back to self-promotion was I was clearly able even in the worst experience of like my career I was able to project myself in a positive way and that's the power of self-promotion and that's the power of how you present yourself well and so yeah make seeing what's available is one of the first steps I'd say as well like going to see are there other of jobs available?

1:20:48Is the pay better? You know, when you speak to people, does that sound like toxic behaviour? Does it sound like it's a bad boss? You know, things observing it. I think the other thing is, do you notice that it's only happening to you or it's happening to everyone? And there's no right or wrong there. So if everybody's being mistreated and everyone's deeply unhappy, well, that's a sign that that's just company culture and it's not a great place to be in, right? And if it is just you, you might be being victimised or bullied and that's also not great but you can try and assess that a bit more rationally I guess rather than it being emotionally so I don't know I think part of my enjoyment of studying human behavior is that I study situations and I observe them a lot and that has allowed me to scope out when I think feels things feel right and when they don't I'm a firm believer that I don't think we learn anything or very, very little from success.

1:21:46I think we've learned everything from failure, from those tough moments. When you look back at those tough moments, those hard times, would you say are those the ones that made you in a way? Yeah, 100%. I don't think in the professional capacity. I think in the personal capacity. So I think the things that I've been through in my personal life are what allows me to be good at what I do now. As I mentioned earlier, there's some of the areas of like things changing out of my control and having to learn to adapt those quite early on. It gives you a head start to prepare for when things don't go right, right?

1:22:30I think we, the common visualization of, you know, rich kids who have a trust fund and they've never I had to work a hard day, his life, you know, all of those things is very true, right? But if that's not been your entire journey, then you have to learn skills quicker. And so that means you are more prepared when things go wrong. I've noticed a lot, especially as a woman, actually, and this is a bit more of a physical thing, but a friend of mine was struggling with aging as a man. And he was sort of saying, I just, I don't like the way I look, my hair's changing, things like that. And it was quite interesting to me that they were only experiencing this change early 30s.

1:23:17So up until this point, they hadn't dealt with body image or their appearance or felt like they had to change in any way. But as women in particular, we are told from 12, 13, 14, you know, stretch marks, you know, change in body shapes, face, all these things that we have to change and adapt. So I think women in particular are fed a narrative and a mainstream message that we always need to better ourselves. We should be doing more. We're not quite there, all of those things. So a bit of a combination of personal life experiences, but also already living through your you know from the age of 12 onward feeling like you need to do more be more say more like there's this this expectance to show up differently or that we are not quite perfect yet is something that I think affects women more than men and I think that in turn makes you push yourself in certain ways i'm gonna go back to self-confidence and selling or self-promoting yourself sometimes you can be seen as fake when you self-promote yourself and this brings me to fake it until you make it what do you think of faking until you make it I don't love the statement, which might be surprising to hear from me.

1:25:00In my book, I talk about blag now, worry later. So it's a riff off fake it till you make it. So to blag is to convince someone you can do something. and I encourage people to blag now worry later because if you can convince someone yeah I can do it and then figure it out and you worry later you figure out you're you're good right you can always find a way to figure something out but if you go into a situation feeling like you're faking it it creates this disconnect you're constantly worrying you're not good enough you're constantly questioning whether you are living up to the version you said you were.

1:25:43And for example, when I was starting to host events, I would be like, the event will be a sellout, right? I will get people, so many people will be here, it will be great. I wasn't faking it, I was blagging it to the event organisers. In my head, I'm like, I've never ran an event, I don't know how I'm going to get 100 people here sort of thing. But I was convincing them that I could make it happen through the self-belief that I will make it happen, right? I didn't need to embody some different person. I didn't need to turn up in a wearing like head to toe designer gear and fake it like, yeah, I've got loads of money.

1:26:20This will be fine. In that moment, I just had to convince people I can do this and then go away and figure it out. And the reason I like black now, worry later is we often don't need to worry later. We can do the thing that we need to do. we just have to believe that we can whereas I think fake it to you make it can send off a message that you're never really being your authentic self and you're never really showing up as who you are because you're faking it and that's not what fuck being humble is about that's very interesting because I've had and I'm going to stop mentioning friends I really should have to stop because they're not going to tell me share with me their stories anymore but some of my friends they didn't start a business because they didn't think that they had the right expertise to go and do whatever is that endeavor that that endeavor that makes them passionate and usually my answer is you gotta obviously first of all believe it yourself but then if you believe it yourself you can convince someone perhaps to invest in your idea having said that it is impossible that whatever business plan you build will have every question fully answered.

1:27:32It's impossible. Having said that, you need to appear in front of an investor that almost every possible scenario is going to be fully answered, or it has been fully covered from an assessment perspective. And I've seen that they struggle with this, like, am I lying? Am I faking it? And I think if you're not able to take that step and take that risk and be like, look, I'm not a liar. I'm not going to fake anything, but ultimately I believe this can happen. The fact that you believe that it can happen, that doesn't mean that you don't have some worries in your head happening. But I think that step is incredibly important for you to get on and do something.

1:28:13In your case, it's becoming the incredibly successful author that you are right now, or this well-reputed public speaker. And in the case of someone who might be becoming an entrepreneur and who knows, maybe perhaps a very successful entrepreneur. But that first step where you got to convince yourself and know that if you have even some self-doubts, that's okay to face an investor or in your case, the event manager to land that event and so on. Yeah. And I think it's, it depends on the situation and the people you're with. So I know someone, I was delivering an event to the biggest crowd I've ever delivered to.

1:28:50and someone was like, are you nervous? And in my head I was like, absolutely. And I was like, yeah, yeah, this is the biggest crowd I've ever spoken in front of. I was like, I know my stuff, but yeah, I feel nervous. I feel quite excited, but I feel nervous. I'm not, I didn't need to fake it and be like, no, not at all. You know, I ate this for breakfast, I'm fine, you know. I didn't, as an individual, I like to think I'm quite authentic with everyone. So the way I speak to you today is also how I would speak to my grandma. It's also how it speaks to my family. Like, I think it is, I know the word gets thrown around a lot, but I live a very happy life because I am able to be myself authentically with almost all the people that I spend time with.

1:29:32But let me ask you the same question in a different setting. So perhaps that was someone from your team or someone even from the event once the event has been signed, landed and so on. But let's say you're speaking with the event organizer, the person that will decide whether you actually get that event or not. if they ask you this question, this is going to be probably the biggest event that you've ever done. Are you nervous? Perhaps if you say yes, they might have doubts on your performance, on your delivery. Would your answer would have been, yes, I am nervous because this is the biggest event I've done.

1:30:01Can you be very honest with this? Honestly, no, I wouldn't. I'm a salesperson. So, you know, my background is advertising and sales. And again, this is me being authentic and honest. In that moment, I would totally be like, no, I'm so excited. This is going to be incredible. You know, that is, there's a difference, but that would be true. That is true. I am excited and I wouldn't be putting myself forward for the thing if I wasn't excited and I wasn't sure in that way. I think what the question comes down to is more about being sure in yourself. That's the most important component. Even today, we, you didn't share the questions with me.

1:30:43I could come in and I was in the cab here and I was thinking, I don't know what I'm about to be asked. This could be any curveball question, but I am sure in myself that I will be able to answer a question. So that inner self-confidence is I am good at what I do with regards to storytelling, communication. Even if you ask me a question that no one has ever asked me and it's a massive curveball i'll be able to handle it first of all thank you thank you for being honest because you could have easily said in front of the cameras um yeah i would have said the same thing and perhaps in front of some people the people that are listening to this you might appear as she's super honest she's raw she's authentic but this is this that might not have been the reality that might not have been the truth the truth is exactly what he said in a different context in a different setting my answer to the same question would be different because I'm trying to get something out of this, right?

1:31:38I'm trying to land this event that perhaps if I give you this very same answer, I might not land this ideal thing that I need right now in my career path. And this is what this whole show is about. So what we're trying to show and demonstrate is what does it really take for you to make it in a given industry, perhaps like yours. If we're only showing the things that are written and you play by the book, perhaps just go to university. But I would like for people to tap into the show so they can really understand that we got to be human and we got to have some sense of normality, right? So for me, having a sense of normality means I'm not a liar.

1:32:25And if I put myself in your shoes, I'm not a liar. I'm also not faking it. But ultimately, yes, of course, I'm putting myself in the shoes of the event organizer. If I tell the event organizer, I am going to be nervous, definitely, even if it's a 1 % chance, he or she is going to think I might not be able to deliver it. And this person has a huge responsibility, some people that he needs to report to, so on and so forth. So there might be other people that he might choose on top of me. So am I nervous? Is this the first time that I'm going to deliver this huge event or speech? Yes. Am I going to say that?

1:32:55Is that the first thing that I'm going to say? Absolutely not. Does that make me a liar or a bad person? In my opinion, absolutely not. And in fact, you are where you are because of those steps, those decisions, those things that he had to say that some people might feel that they're compromising, which I don't, allowed you to unlock your full potential, your path. You know, perhaps also in different examples, the Kardashians went through the same things. In my opinion, that is not faking it until you make it. But as you said, not everyone is born with a trust fund and all the resources for you to deploy and immediately open every door.

1:33:28You've got to open them in the most strategic and effective way possible. And for all of these reasons, I thank you for being honest. Well, that's, it's part of me as a person, but I also want to say is that is the blag now, worry later mentality. So in that moment, I will have blagged it and said, yes, because I'm convincing the person, yes, I can do this, no problem. And if I I need to then go worry later and tell all my friends like, oh my God, what I'm going to do. And I need to practice every single day until that event where it would be wrong is if I just told that event organizer, I can do it all in Spanish.

1:34:07That is faking it until I make it. That is not me. That's, that is me over committing to something I can't deliver on. And I think what we have to consider with that question is there is fake it till you make it. It creates this thing that you can do anything and it will work out. And I don't think that's right. Me saying, yeah, I can do it in Spanish. I would have had to cancel all work, learn Spanish, do a terrible job, all of this thing. That's why I think that phrase is problematic. So I think it's also understanding your bandwidth of what are you actually committing to here. So certain things might make you feel nervous.

1:34:50it might make you feel excited but understanding whether you have the skills in you to do it is different to over committing to something that is way out of your reach 100 i agree you obviously work i mean your work is related to people working with people understanding people helping people motivating people what is the most surprising thing that have learned about human behavior? Such a good question. I think the most surprising thing I've learned about human behavior is even when people really want something, they don't do it. The most obvious solutions are in front of them and they just don't do it.

1:35:38So I have so many people that will come to me like, Steph, I want to start a podcast. Steph, I want to write a book. Steph, I want to start a business. Steph, I want to do this. And I'm like, okay. And I'm such an overgiver as we talked about. I'm like, let's set up an hour. We'll do a meeting. I'll map out this plan. I hand it over to them. Clear, step by step, what needs to be done. Six months later, I'm like, how are you doing? Like, I haven't done anything. And it happens so often. What's the main reason for that happening? Well, my question now back to them is when they say, how do I do it?

1:36:09I say, what's going to stop you doing it? Because I've learned now that in order to protect my time, we have to get to the root of the block blocker we have to get to the root of the problem of what's going to stop you and certain things can be a friend of mine is a good example she wanted to start posting video content she's a dj and she wanted to post video content of favorite tracks she was listening to that she could recommend so she's a dj well within her right to be posting that content. She had this worry because we'd planned out loads of ideas on how she could post on TikTok, but she didn't do anything.

1:36:47So I said, what's going on here? What's the problem? And she said, I'm worried that people in my network are going to think, who is she? Like, who does she think she is to start sharing recommendations? So much of what we're worried about is external. It's so much. I think if we, if I could like look in a magic ball, like a mystic Megan and say, whatever you put out in the world, everyone will love it. You'd see people creating things tomorrow, right? It is the fear of judgment from other people. And when I sat down, I said, okay, so what will help you? Let's say this is the problem. You're worried that people are going to question who you are.

1:37:26Why are you popping up all of a sudden? What's going to help you start that? And she was like, I just don't know. I don't know how to, I don't know how to start. It's often that start thing. Even if you're so super qualified, it's the, what's the first thing I need to do and how do I hit that button and say launch? And I came up, she helped me come up with this new phrase, which is soft launch yourself. So if you read any newspapers or magazines or stuff, you'll see there's a phrase called soft launching in relationships, which is where people will show you a glimmer of holding hands with someone, but not show you their face.

1:38:00So you're soft launching a relationship online, but you don't show them everything. And I said to her, what you, what it feels like you need to do is kind of soft launch yourself before you start posting content, just to re-remind people why they're following you, what you're about to share, who you are. And I showed her an example that I'd seen on, on TikTok actually. And this girl said, Hey, to any people that are new here, I'm, I'm Steph and And I love rollerblading and I love art and I love music, but I also really love knitting. So over the next 12 months, I'm going to be sharing my knitting projects with you.

1:38:32If you like it, great. And if you don't, send it to a friend who might, right? It was a really simple piece of content, but it's a really great starting point for anybody who's like, I just want to press that button and go, but I'm worried that people are going to be like, where's this coming from? To respond to that, you say, we'll start the conversation then. Frame it. tell your followers or tell the people that follow you, this is what I'm about to share. If you like it, great. And if you don't, start following me, right? But I think what we have is we grow up with people following us, people from school, family members.

1:39:07And then if we try and show up as our true self or our passion or our hobby or the thing we really care about, we are so fixed and worried about what are these older people that I really don't actually care about going to think about me, previous colleagues, family members, ex-relationships, old friends, They saw you in a different way. So how could you be showing up like this? So a good starting point is to create this reintroduction of yourself. Like, hi, everyone, this is me now. So if you enjoy it, great. And if you don't. And that I've recommended to a lot of people in my network and it's helped them so much.

1:39:40It's literally been that thing where it's like, I can post freely now. I know why I'm doing this and I've already announced it and this is that thing. so I think that's a really good example of how when we're thinking about what stops people and and I guess yeah the my fascination with human behavior is even when the options are so clear in front of people there are always going to be there will be something that's going to hold them back that's nothing to do with the plan it's to do with something internal and I know when I started posting video content I I hated it because I hate the sound of my own voice I like speaking on stages because I don't have to watch it back.

1:40:21I don't have to listen to myself back. In fact, I have like forced myself to like listen to every podcast I sit on now to check for, you know, qualities to control, of course, that I've not said something wrong or it's not been edited in a bad way or anything. But I used to hate the sound of my own voice, like seriously hate it, which I think there's a study out there that says everyone does. So I was like, no, I don't do video content. It's not my thing. I'm not going to do video content. And then I started getting opportunities coming through. Hey, would you make a video? It's a thousand pounds for a brief.

1:40:51Or hey, would you do this partnership? We want you to film video content. And I started to see that there were more opportunities that could come if I let go of this inner thing that no one else has commented on. No one's ever told me you've got an annoying voice. This is an internal thing of mine that I believe to be true. And I was like, right, ditch the ego, get over yourself. You're not that important. You have a business and a message that people can benefit from. Does the fact that you don't love the sound of your own voice, is that going to stop you from going to do these great things? And that was one of the best conversations I had with myself.

1:41:30So I think for anyone listening, don't ask yourself, how do I get there? Ask yourself what's stopping me? I think the soft launch method could be applied to so many other things to get people to start because I agree with you. I am a firm believer that going from zero to one is much harder than going from one to 100. So getting people on that zero to one in whatever it is, it's incredibly important, whether it's building a business and starting your business or whether it's starting a healthy diet or even quitting smoking, right? If you are thinking about all the complexities of, let's say, for example, going to the gym, I got to come into five days a week and I only have one day off or two days off and I got to do this for two, three, four months until I start seeing results.

1:42:23I'm not going to go and show up on the first day because it sounds very complex. I think your soft launch methodology is effectively simplifying it, making it easier for us to digest and smaller and say, okay, I might not be able to come into this whole thing, but I can do this smaller one. So I'm just going to show up tomorrow to the gym and see what happens. Or I want to quit smoking. Oh, if the first thing that I think of is I can't smoke for the rest of my life, you're definitely not going to quit. But think I'm not going to smoke tomorrow and let's see what happens. Yes. And I think that's, I think it's a really good point.

1:42:56Like I often joke, like I professionally, I'm very, I wouldn't even say strict, but I know I'm very good at being professional in that way. Personally, I'm not that healthy. Like I don't have a great diet. I need to be a healthier person. I need to exercise more. If you look at my career versus my personal, I'm not 100 % giving the same energy. And something that's really helped me recently is just asking myself, what would a healthy person do? So rather than being like, no more crisps, no more Diet Coke, no more whatever it is, especially martinis, all of these things, just asking myself, what would a healthy person do?

1:43:37And I know this sounds so basic, but just things like instead of getting the train, I'm going to walk because a healthy person would choose to get more steps in rather than be like, I've got to do 10K every day. It's 10K steps. I'm going to do, I'm just going to walk to this place instead of getting on the bus, which I normally do. Or if I'm making a sandwich, it's like, okay, I'm not going to be annoyed at myself that I want a sandwich that has carbs and diet culture from the nineties and all that bad mindset. What would a healthy person do? Well, they probably make a salad on the side or they might add in an extra few ingredients that have more nutrition in them so rather than like yeah this complete shift in identity and who I am how do we just make it feel a little bit smaller and a little bit more accessible we talk so much about the things we're going to do before we do them and that's the problem because we talk ourselves out of it before it's even happened

1:44:34if you look back at everything you've done all the things you've learned if you were to summarize everything into one advice one great lesson learned what would it be slow down so I think my ambition has been so consistent I have been an ambitious person and I think at school I was I wanted to do well but I definitely cared more about like friends and parties and you know fitting in more than I did about like what university I'd go to but there was something about my university degree that really brought out and it was clearly that I'd found the thing that I was meant to be doing the studying the communication the marketing I'd found that thing that brings me alive and ever since my first job it was just fast-paced moving need more want more like give me more do more all of this and I think now I run my own business the thing I enjoy the most is like freedom and space and having the space to think about things.

1:45:48And I know we talked about this earlier about what it means to run a business. I am actively not going for investment. I am actively not hiring a team. I am actively not trying to scale my business to be a five, 10 million pound business company, right? Like I am actively doing things that are more about slowness and being in the present and enjoying the moment and not striving to this when I get to this point I'll be happy mindset which is so flawed everyone I know that is unhappy has that mindset and really trying to soak up and enjoy the present moment and I think the other thing that I've observed this year I've had a really difficult year personally and I have learned what capacity means.

1:46:36So for me, I used to say yes to everyone, to everything, not even in a people pleasing way, but more in a like, don't want to miss out on the opportunity. Must say yes. I must go to that networking event because I could meet someone. I must say yes to this opportunity because it might open this. Like I had this, like, I don't want to miss out. I'm so hungry for this. And this year I've, I found myself not having the mental or physical capacity to say yes to everything. And where I might've done a free job for someone and things like that, I had to pull it back and be like in survival mode of what do you need to do and what can wait?

1:47:17And I had a chat with a friend recently and I said, I've got this idea and she just went, what is the most important before the end of the year and I'm working on a very big project at the moment one that can't be changed will be out to the masses and I'll never get the chance to redo it again and it was very clear that was the one thing I needed to focus on so everything else can wait like things can wait I'm 32 like I'm going to be working at least for another 20 years if I'm working on this business I need to have these ideas in the bank otherwise I'll have no ideas left so I think this it's so great to have hunger ambition passion absolutely but pace and doing it at a pace that you feel is right is I think the secret to success because I'm the least stressed I've ever been I'm the happiest I've been even after a difficult year in my career I am the happiest, most content, most calm, most confident because I'm not chasing someone else's timeline, because I'm not adhering to what other people think it means to run a business.

1:48:33I am well and truly making my rules up, living a great personal and professional life. And really, when I reflect on it, the thing that has led to that is slowing down.

1:48:50How would you define success? Freedom. Would you say you're successful now? Yeah, I would say so. For me personally, when I say freedom, it's the freedom to go get on a plane tomorrow and work remotely for a month on a beach in Bali. It's the freedom to say, I'm going to do 10 free jobs next week because they're meaningful, passionate, passionate projects of mine. And I think I can make a good impact. So freedom has always been at the core of what I care about. And I talk quite publicly about this. I don't know if I want to have kids. I don't know if I want a family. And a big factor to that is freedom, because I feel I want this freedom to live and experience life on my own terms.

1:49:44Now that might change and it could do in the future. But one of my core values is freedom. And so again, with the decisions I make about my business, I've considered running things like community groups. So having a Slack channel or a space where people can speak and connect, but that doesn't actually live into my freedom value because it means I'd be a community manager responding to messages every single day. And it means I'd have to keep that up. and actually businesses that have that generally have a dedicated community manager. They also have a marketing director. But when I wear so many different hats in my job because there is no one else helping me run the business, I have to make decisions on what allows me to live my life with a level of freedom that I'm happy with.

1:50:31So to be able to take this Friday off because the diary is not busy and I just fancy a long weekend with my girls. Like that is, that's success. It's not having my life dictated by work, but work enhancing my life. Thank you. Thank you very much for joining me this morning for the honesty, for how raw the conversation was. I was able to truly see you, what you stand for, your true colors. I think that since we're kids, we inherit these narratives about a lot of things. For example, I don't know if this was the same case for you, but when I was a kid, my parents, my grandparents used to tell me, you need to drink an orange juice every morning because that's good for you.

1:51:25Well, as science progressed, we have seen that this is not only false, but it's actually unhealthy for so many different reasons. You're effectively doing that, but in a much more complex environment, which is trying to redefine a word that is very much embedded into our society, which is being humble. and you are trying to approach this from place from a from a very health perspective healthy perspective you're trying to help people become the best versions of themselves whether it's personal or professionally by building up confidence and you're not fighting against an irrelevant opponent you're fighting against one of the most well preserved traits in society which is being humble.

1:52:18And that already by definition makes you one of the bravest person I've ever met. So I thank you for that. And I'm really looking forward to joining one of your talks and getting that rush of energy and confidence that I'm sure that every person that you've helped has felt. Thank you. And thank you for inviting me to speak. It's been so nice to chat with you today. Thank you.

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